Stars of the Game
1st: Jeff Suppan
2nd: Jason Kendall
3rd: Ryan Braun
I came into the series fully expecting to take two of three. Now, we’ve got to salvage the last game to kick the Brewers out on a high note. With Dempster going tomorrow it’s going to be…how shall we say it…fun. On to the notes:
  • Ted Lilly did not have his A game or even his B game today. It seems fitting that I asked the question about if his season last year was a fluky. I’m not terribly worried that he’ll regress massively, but I do feel he won’t match his numbers last year. Sure, he may win the same number of games, but the secondary stats will be less impressive. That’s not to say that we can’t win with that, because we certainly can. It simply means that he overachieved last year and will regress slightly this year.
  • Why is it that everyone was running on Jason Kendall last year like crazy and yet we’re not even attempting steals? The Brewers are running up and down the bases on us and it’s not even on Geo. Our pitching staff has massive issues with holding runners on base and it was exposed, yet again, today during the middle innings. For cryin’ out loud, Corey Hart stole 2nd and 3rd after walking to get on in the sixth inning. If we’re going to essentially give the runners the bases, that’s fine. It just becomes very important to limit the base runners to minimize damage. Walks become killers when you let people steal.
  • I felt like this entire game was given to Milwaukee. That’s not to say that they didn’t play well, because they did. It just seemed to me like we gave them a lot more than they should have received. Take the sixth inning for example. Hart leads off with the walk and steals 2nd and 3rd. Kendall gets on with a walk and then takes 2nd on a steal and 3rd on a wild pitch. The inning ends with a run on the scoreboard and no hits to show for it. That can’t happen.
  • Brewer hitters have been plunked at an alarming rate to start. Weeks was hit twice last game and Fatty was hit twice today. When you hit Weeks, you probably can expect the team to take it in stride and not retaliate. When you hit Fatty twice, you can expect some retaliation. Watch for someone to take one for the team tomorrow and find themselves on 1st after being hit in the back. If this was a LaRussa team it would have happened already, twice.
  • Sad news today that Micah Hoffpauir went down with an oblique injury in an exhibition game. He’s expected to miss several weeks as it’s an injury you don’t want to rush. Remember that he had a great season last year as well before going down for the year with an injury. The kid can’t catch a break. I wish him the best as he recovers.
  • Does the Soriano hop annoy you as much as it annoys me? Every time he catches the ball he hops. It just seems dumb.
  • Geo should have never made the throw in the 6th when Kendall ran. He double clutched and then almost got Mike Fontenot killed when Kendall barreled into him. Sometimes you have to put the ball in your pocket and try to get the guy at the plate.
  • Derrek Lee hit a home run today and now you will have people that pitch their tents in one of two camps. Either they are in the camp that believes Lee is back and will compete for the MVP and then there are those that believe Lee had a career year and will not approach that ever again. I’m in the latter camp. What about you?
  • The Brewers have a pitcher named Riske (pronounced “risky”) Seattle has a guy named Putz (though it’s not pronounced the way that would make it humorous). Can you think of other pitchers that have names that would be worthy of being made fun of? I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not have my closer with those two names, despite the fact that J.J. Putz is a pretty darn good closer.
  • Felix Pie picked up a really nice hit in the 7th with a 2-2 count. He was at 1-2 and worked another ball before singling on a line drive to left. Give the kid a break and be patient. He can do good things.
  • With the minor league games starting over the next few days, our minor league coverage will pick up, mostly in the diaries with daily farm reports. If you find a player you want tracked, feel free to drop me a line. We’ve also brought in Jon Pence who wrote the Road to Wrigley blog last year to share his farm knowledge.